Trump’s Biggest Lies: Tax Records Tell the Truth
In his best year, Trump reported that he lost $11 million on real estate.
For the last seven years or so we’ve been told that Donald J Trump’s taxes weren’t available for public disclosure because they were being audited by the IRS. All other presidential candidates over the last two decades have released their own returns during the campaign, but Trump had plenty to hide.
Now we know for sure he was lying, thanks to the release of a report by the staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation shortly after the House Ways and Means Committee. There was no ongoing audit; he isn’t any good at earning an honest living, and played a shell game to avoid paying taxes.
Trump’s full income tax returns, and those of eight related business entities for the tax years 2015 through 2020 will be posted online once personal information (addresses & such) is redacted.
Trump’s net federal tax on $154 million of positive income in 2015-2020 was just $776,126, amounting to a tax rate of 0.5%, while the average American paid roughly 27 times more. Earlier this year, President Joe Biden reported paying at a of 24.6%.
A separate report released by the Ways and Means Committee reveals that the only audit of just one of Trump’s tax returns while he was serving as president was ordered after Congress asked to see his taxes. And the audit was dropped, supposedly because it was too complicated for the IRS to complete.
A continuing pattern of deception runs through these documents, and we can expect a steady drip of stories about the gamesmanship used to avoid paying taxes. What the returns don’t tell us are the steps taken by the administration to circumvent an ongoing IRS policy dating back nearly five decades of auditing the annual returns of sitting presidents.
Congress has had these returns for a while now, but couldn’t disclose any information while the former president’s lawyers fought to keep the public from seeing them. And to their credit, nothing leaked.
Here’s analysis from Laura Clawson at Daily Kos:
In the short time the returns have been available to the House committee, they’ve identified a number of issues with each year of the returns. That includes not just multiple questionable charitable deductions, but a lot of deductions that are reported as large “cash” payments for which there doesn’t appear to be documentation. The committee also notes the use of Trump’s 500+ sole proprietorship businesses as a means of reporting everyday costs of living, and some expensive hobbies, as if they are legitimate business deductions.
Trump also appears to have written off over $2 million in property taxes as an income deduction; the committee notes that New York law caps that deduction at $10,000.
What’s also striking is that in every single year, including 2018, Trump’s core businesses—his golf courses, hotels, and real estate—operated at a reported loss. If Donald Trump actually makes money at anything, it’s not any of the areas in which he brags about being a success. In his best year, Trump reported that he lost $11 million on real estate.
Republicans have responded to the release of what’s likely to be a series of damaging revelations by…. drum roll… threatening to reveal the tax returns of Hunter Biden.
Geez, if only those GOP-types could read or knew how to use a search engine.
An IRS investigation into the younger Biden’s business affairs started in 2018, and he subsequently paid off a tax liability of over $1 million a year after learning he was under investigation for defrauding the IRS.
A group of GOP Congressmen, led by Rep. Kevin Brady, the ranking Republican on the Ways and Means Committee, held a press conference featuring a complete and utter falsehood, namely that Congressional inquiries into tax returns was something new. (It’s not)
“Over our objections in opposition, Democrats have unleashed a dangerous new political weapon that overturns decades of privacy protections. The era of political targeting, and of Congress’s enemies list, is back and every American, every American taxpayer, who may get on the wrong side of the majority in Congress is now at risk.”
There’s plenty of irony here, as a decade-long GP campaign to defund the Internal Revenue Service has left it unable to carry out many of its mandates. When Democrats obtained passage of funding that would expand the IRS workforce and replace those that are retiring, Republicans took to the campaign trail to falsely claim that 87,000 agents would be harassing everyday Americans.
House Republicans have already made clear that they will be making things as ugly as possible in the name of “investigations.” House Oversight Committee Republicans already have a page dedicated to “Biden Family Investigation,” and when Republicans are feeling frisky, they go with “Biden crime family.”
Nothing Democrats can do is going to make it better or worse. Abuse of power is already the Republican way, and Democrats using power appropriately to address a small part of Donald Trump’s abuses, with the blessing of the Trump Supreme Court, is simply not comparable.
The original justification for the Democrats quest for the former president’s tax returns, aside from the appearance of sleaziness of his excuses for non-disclosure, was the perceived need for new legislation to ensuring the IRS made timely examinations of presidential tax returns while disclosing certain information to the public.
And, as it turns out, there is a need for such legislation.
The other thing to look for coming out of this release of financial information will be whether or not it causes reputational damage to the Trump family’s businesses. Will the fragile ego of the family’s leader withstand revelations making him look weak, or will he continue to deny the truth and hit back at perceived enemies? I’m betting on the latter option.
From Politico:
Democrats’ impending release of the returns will create an opportunity for a crowdsourced audit, with outside tax experts eager to weigh in, something Trump confidante Michael Cohen told Congress in 2019 that Trump feared if they ever became public.
“What he didn’t want was to have an entire group of think tanks that are tax experts run through his tax returns and start ripping it to pieces, and then he’ll end up in an audit and he’ll ultimately have taxable consequences, penalties and so on,” Cohen said.
Remember: Trump wasn’t simply “cheating the tax system.” He was cheating you.
Email me at: WritetoDougPorter@Gmail.com
Lead image ℅ American Oversight.